


I Felt a Funeral, in My Brain

by prolix (shal)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Auror Partners, Friends to Lovers, HP My Bloody Valentine 2021, M/M, Memory Loss, POV Draco Malfoy, POV Second Person, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-13 00:21:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29518011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shal/pseuds/prolix
Summary: It's not his fault, of course—it's yours. You never thought you’d see Potter after the war, much less work with him. Now you look at Potter in the midst of a raid, curses flying, green eyes blazing, and a small part of you still thinks his wand is aimed at you.But you know how to fix that.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 10
Kudos: 45
Collections: My Bloody Valentine 2021





	I Felt a Funeral, in My Brain

**Author's Note:**

> This idea has been on my mind for a while! I'm glad that I finally had the chance to write it. Please mind the tags and enjoy ❤️
> 
> Thank you so much to [uphorie](https://uphorie.tumblr.com/) for the lovely beta work and to [writcraft](https://writcraft.tumblr.com/) for coordinating this fest!

You can’t remember the dream you had the night before. 

You suspect it was a bad one. It’s not often that you wake up with your wand clutched in hand after all. You’ve been having nightmares since the war, but they’ve become more frequent as of late.

You wonder if it’s because of Potter.

Potter, who slipped back into your life after the war as easily as you shrug on your Auror robes every morning, whose boots now march beside your own down the corridors of the Ministry, who sits across from you in a pub every Friday night, your partner. Your friend. Your walking, talking, devastatingly handsome reminder of the past.

It's not his fault, of course—it's yours. You never thought you’d see Potter after the war, much less work with him. Now you look at Potter in the midst of a raid, curses flying, green eyes blazing, and a small part of you still thinks his wand is aimed at you.

But you know how to fix that.

* * *

You can't remember much about your time at Hogwarts. 

The first few years are hazy, shrouded in age. You remember the tightness of your throat on the Hogwarts Express. The weight of the Sorting Hat on your head. Your first-second-third real spells. Writing home to Father. A wand in your face during your first duel. Wind rushing past your ears as you ran drills for Quidditch practice. Glimpses of the Giant Squid through the windows of the Slytherin common room. Your own laugh, mocking, echoing in your ear. Jealousy settling in the pit of your stomach, for a reason you can't quite make sense of now. 

And it's even harder to recall anything from after fifth year. All you know are bits and pieces: a letter from Mother; water dripping from a leaky faucet; NEWTS; the sickening crunch of a broken nose under your shoe; Potter, of course, you’d never forget about Potter. You know what it means—these jagged tears in your memory, the tattered shreds that remain.

It means you hardly recognize anyone at pub nights anymore. 

You're sat in a crowd of strangers, pushed into a booth beside a chatty, pug-nosed woman ( _what was her name again? Peony?_ ) and a handsome man called Blaise. Potter’s the only familiar face here. He’s across from you, sandwiched between a tall man with red hair and a shorter, dark-skinned woman who keeps monopolizing the table’s conversation. The others act as if they've known you for years, like Potter. Maybe they have; it's hard to tell who you're supposed to know and who you aren't these days. 

At some point, though, in between sips of your Firewhisky, things at the pub turn tense. Posey, Blaise, and Potter’s friends get into a row about Hogwarts, about something you no longer remember. Potter gets involved, and the fury in his eyes reminds you of… reminds you of…

You slip away from the booth as the memories start to flood in, as your strongholds and careful scaffolding begin to crumble under their weight. You make it to the washroom, press yourself to the grimy tile walls, and reach for your wand.

Potter finds you eventually, the way he always does when it gets to be _too much_. He has a Calming Draught in his hand, but you no longer need it.

* * *

You can't remember the war.

No, that's not true. You remember the war. You remember that you—and your family, and your friends—were on the wrong side of the war. You remember that Potter was on the right side of the war.

But, you can't remember what Voldemort’s face looked like. You can't remember what it felt like to cast a Crucio. You can't remember the fear, the anger, the shame, the horror. 

It makes things between you two tricky. You’ve seen the haunted look in Potter’s eyes whenever you're assigned to track down escaped Death Eaters, the grief that sits on his shoulders every second of May, and you can't empathize anymore. 

You hope he hasn't noticed.

Because you know that's one of the things Potter likes about you. That you _understand_. It's one of the reasons he trusts you, one of the reasons he lets his palm rest on your thigh under the table, one of the reasons he can't keep his eyes off of you in the middle of a crowded pub.

The two of you are back in your booth—alone this time. It's reminiscent of the time you spent together in training. That's when the weekly pub nights started, morsels of relief after the long, grueling courses you had to take as Auror trainees. It used to be just Potter and yourself then; the others came later. You think you used to like when they joined you two but now it's hard to remember why you're friends with them.

Your ‘friends’ took the Floo home, still fuming over their argument from earlier. Potter's calmed down a bit, and takes slow, lazy sips from his gin and tonic. Savoring it the way you wish he would savor you.

You catch his gaze and head towards the door, hoping he follows.

* * *

You can't remember Harry.

You know Potter. War hero. The Boy Who Lived. Your Auror partner and tentative friend-turned-something more. But you don't know why Potter looks at you as though the two of you are fated, as if you’ve been dancing around one another for _years_ rather than a few months. You think that there might have been a time where you knew him better than you do now. Maybe you did in a past life.

It certainly feels that way when he presses you up against the pub’s back wall, its bricks digging into your shoulders. His lips move on yours as though he owns them, as though he knows exactly how to make you fall apart even though you’ve never done this with him before. You clutch at his shoulders, his jaw, his hair, scrambling for any notion that this is real, that he’s real, that you really feel this _good_.

He takes you back to his flat. You're all over each other as soon as you land on his doorstep, desire bubbling over the dizziness from the Apparition. His lips never leave your own, kissing the life out of you in every room that stands between the front door and his bedroom. You start to memorize the way his hands feel around your waist, the way his stubble feels under your fingers, the way your hips slide together with every step, explosive bursts of pleasure running up your spine. 

You're on the bed, then, and you let him devour you. He’s slow about it, dropping kisses over your collarbone and deftly working at the buttons of your shirt. There's a sharp intake of breath, and you look up to find him staring at the scars on your chest, the ones you don't think about anymore.

“It's okay,” you whisper and remember, suddenly, terribly, that you don't know Harry the way you know Potter, “we’re okay.”

You close your eyes and try to forget the look on his face. You hear him take another breath and then, finally, he kisses you. 

It's better than anything your wand could do.

* * *

You can't remember the scars, the ones that mar your chest.

You pretended like you did, though. You didn't have a choice, not really, not after seeing the expression on his face, handsome features stricken with guilt and regret. You remember the way he apologized, over and over and over again, after you both had finished. The way he kissed them, lips tracing over the thin white lines, tears following in their wake.

It occurs to you then that no amount of forgetting will stop others from remembering what you did.

It's this thought that propels you out of bed, away from Potter’s sleeping form. You pick up your wand, which lay strewn haphazardly on the floor, and head to the washroom. You have to bite back a hiss at the feeling of icy tiles under your bare feet. You have to clench your fists against the overwhelming anxiety that threatens to swallow you whole.

You face your reflection in the mirror and spare a wince for the love bites you won't remember in the morning. The sight of them makes you reconsider for a split-second, makes you think of the man you left behind in bed.

You still can't shake his look on his face from your head.

You raise your wand with a shaky hand and aim it towards your forehead. ready to snap the last thread tethering you to yourself. The _real_ you. 

“ _Obliviate._ ”

* * *

You can't remember the dream you had the night before. 

You suspect it was a bad one. It’s not often that you wake up with your wand clutched in hand after all. It's not often you wake up in an unfamiliar bed either, though, next to a man you don't recognize.

“Draco? Are you alright?” he asks, and his expression—worried, your mind supplies belatedly—is somehow familiar. 

“Who are you?” you manage to croak out before cringing. You don't think you’ve ever treated a one night stand this badly before.

“You don't—you don't know who I am?” The words would sound entitled from anyone else but from him, it sounds rather dear. Poor thing.

You take a good look at him, at the scar that spans his forehead, the dark skin and even darker, messier hair. You wrack your brain, trying to remember if you've ever seen him before, at work, at the pub, in bed…

You can’t remember.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Emily Dickinson's [poem](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45706/i-felt-a-funeral-in-my-brain-340) of the same name.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading! Feel free to come find me on [Tumblr](https://prolix-.tumblr.com/)!


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